A whale watching experience cannot be described in words easily, as you have to see it for yourself to believe it. The magnificent beauty of these enormous creatures will leave you in awe. For an exciting and out of the world whale watching experience, head to the striking coastline of Sydney and view the wonders of the ocean life with your own eyes.

Best Spots

Sydney has some amazing locations from where you can easily spot whales and other marine life. Some of the best spots are:

Cape Solander

Located in Botany Bay National Park, Cape Solander tops the list of the best whale watching spots in Sydney. It has a viewing platform that offers stunning views of the gigantic mammals.

Bare Island Fort

The finest scuba diving and snorkelling points in New South Wales are around this area. Whale watching is one of the prime activities offered at this location along with bird watching, fishing, swimming and a lot more.

Shark Island

The popular picnic spot offers stunning 360 degree views of the area. You will surely spot a whale here as many whales swim near the harbour while on their migratory journey.

Cape Baily Coast Walk

This coastal walk is an amazing way to explore the diverse wildlife of Sydney. In addition to enjoying the natural beauty around the area, you will also be able to catch site of a whale or two between the migrating seasons. You may also spot sea eagles, kestrels and terns along the way.

Cruise

For a better and closer view of the massive creatures, head out into the ocean on one of the many cruises in Sydney. The whale watching cruises are easily accessible from many points in the city. Hop onboard a catamaran for an open air ride into the waters. You will be able to view whales up-close in their natural habitat along with live commentary from a marine biologist who will provide interesting facts to make your tour more enjoyable.

Best Times

The best time for whale watching is during the migrating season, from May till December. The whales travel north to breed in the Coral Sea and then return South to the Antarctic during these months. The peak months to sight whales is June, July and October.

A Little about Whales

In your whale watching sightings, you may be able to spot whale species like Humpbacks, Southern Right whales, Minke, Orca and Pilot Whales. Moreover, you may also spot other marine life like green turtles, dolphins, seals and sharks.

After the breeding season, the young will be seen swimming along with their mothers. You will be able to see them being schooled by their mothers and putting up a show of amusing and adorable antics as well.

Useful Tips

It is important to follow some tips for an optimal whale watching experience:

For a whale sighting, look near the shore as well as in the horizon for any disturbance on the water’s surface. Many whales create a disturbance with their fins and tails.

You’ve probably heard all about pricebeating. Heck, you’ve probably ‘pricebeat’ someone. What I mean is, with the hugely competitive market of booking things online, direct with a supplier or direct with a travel agent, even as an agent myself I can’t blame people for wanting to make sure you’re getting the absolute best deal.

So what does pricebeating mean, why do prices fluctuate and why should you hunt around?

Basically, imagine this – you’ve been in to see a travel agent and been given one price. Then, you find the same room type with the hotel directly for slightly cheaper. Then, you find another website that sells a bit of everything and find it even cheaper. Sometimes it happens in this order, and sometimes it’s the other way around.

When a hotel prices something, the generally make it one price. They then give it to the travel agents and websites – travel companies can then do what they want with them, but as far as I’ve seen as a rule of thumb the travel companies don’t mark them up as they’re already given to us with a level of commission built in. The reason the hotel might have it cheaper directly is because they put their own sale on, and don’t pass it onto the agents (thus, really making us look like are ripping people off, but hey it saves the hotel having to pay commission out!). Those other websites that sell a little bit of everything change their prices around willy nilly – I don’t presume to know how they work, but they often have huge credit card and service charges at the end, so I’ll take a stab and say this would certainly help account for making up some of their loss they might make on one nights accommodation in Bangkok they sell for 50% off the RRP.

Make sense?

So if you’ve managed to stay tuned until now, here’s some tips.

Shop around online, and even direct with the hotel.

Make sure all of the prices are on an Australian website.

Speak to your travel agent, because more often than not we also get rates that you can’t find anywhere else (hey, what else would we pay our head office for, if they didn’t negotiate the bestest ever deals!), and once you’ve collated the best prices, BOOK WITH THE AGENT.

Because even if their price was slightly higher (in my experience we usually do have the best price anyway, and NO we don’t add any service taxes like your online sites) we can pricebeat it for you. Yep, travel agents will still book you the absolute cheapest price for what you want AND you have the benefit of booking with a real human, who’ll be able to give you multiple payment options, give you itineraries, receipts and invoices on demand, liase with all suppliers on your behalf (you wouldn’t even KNOW the hassle of time changes the airlines give us to deal with), and send you your documents. Travel agents can also do any amendments for you, name changes, date changes and complete itinerary changes without you having to call an Asian call centre. BONUS. Also, who wants to deal with trying to organise their own holiday and guessing that they’re not getting ripped off, when they can have someone who is trained and paid to do that, at no extra cost?

Heading to England anytime soon? No doubt you’ll have been crying into your socks about the exchange rate, because frankly it’s horrid. We’re basically halving our money, and how are we seriously supposed to afford all of the Guinness and Steak and Ale pies with that amount of money! (Hint- head north, its so much cheaper than London!). When you’re traveling abroad it can be one of the last things you think about organising, after the flights and things you’re going to do, so I’m here to give you the low down.

how I take money with me abroad

Easy – the same way I always have actually, and it’s using the Cash Passport Multi Currency Card. When I first started traveling, they had a different card for different currencies, but have now combined them all onto one card which is awesome – so if you’re traveling around the word, you can load pounds, euros and dollars onto one card in one go. Not only do you get the rate of the day (so make sure to follow the exchange rate and choose a good time to load on), but it stays as this loaded rate, even if the currency falls tomorrow.

Another benefit is there are no charges to use the card as an eftpos card when you’re out, or at an ATM. The only ATM charges you’ll received are the ones that come from the particular ATM itself, which basically means you’ll always have some small charge but the difference in using this to your normal bank card, is your only being charged the one fee and not from your bank as well.

tips of the trade

Try loading a big sum at once – you get charged around a 1% loading fee so the more transactions you do, the more you’ll end up paying. You’ll also probably pay your travel agent a small commission if you load with them every time as well, so try to eliminate that.

Follow the exchange rate. You can use websites like Travelex to track them and received email updates.

Don’t take out a lot of small sums at ATM’s and get charged every time – take our larger sums, but obviously keep your money safe, whether it be in a safe in your hotel room or in a money wallet on your body.

where can I get one of these currency cards?

Any travel agent should be able to supply you with one, but you can also buy them online and have it posted out.

An awesome new product has hit the market for anybody under 30 who is looking to travel and stay protected on a budget – It’s the Student Flights Black Market Travel Insurance, and dahm it looks fine! It’s exclusive to the brand, and is a world first in terms of inclusions and discounts.

Ever been living and working in England, or France, or Cambodia and got so sick you couldn’t work? Did your rent fall behind? Covermore heard you crying and have sent help – So if you’re deemed unfit to work for 5 or more days, you’ll be eligible to claim the amount you have to pay in rent until you get better. Jump back into bed, and sleep it off my friend.

And my fellow USA travellers will hear me here – tried buying a policy for America only to be given a quote you could buy a small car with? In all fairness, America have a terrible medical system and without travel insurance, a trip to the ICU will set you back $5,000 USD per night, so the pricing for the insurance is understandable. But when you’re a poor Uni student (or just a poor 25 year old, I feel you), it can seem quite stiff. There’s always been excess options of $0 (the best but most expensive), $100 and $250 but this new policy has a $1,000 option. It means the price you pay for your insurance now is much lower than your smaller excess options which is grand (Vegas money!), however make sure you fully understand that if you need to make a claim, you’ll pay the first $1,000, before Covermore step in and take care of the rest. This means you really eliminate a lot of claims you might make, for example stolen luggage, phones etc as they’ll all generally be claims under a thousand dollars. But for the medical emergencies, even a simple Xray, this one will be a lifesaver.

Has your RyanAir, those trusty on time specialists, flight been delayed? Are you going to miss the first day of your pre paid Oktoberfest package because of this? Blackmarket cover will swoop in and help get you there on time with another, on time provider with cover of up to $2,000! This also covers 25th and 50th wedding anniversaries, weddings, funerals and pre paid conferences.

They’ve also added in bundles of extra covered activities, like quad biking, jet skiing, abseiling and scuba diving which are not covered on the other policies and is a great bonus for the adventurous.

It still covers all of the normal things like unlimited medical and dental (which is a huge plus that Covermore offer, many insurers will at least cap your dental at $500), $5,000 of luggage cover (now including Go Pros) and $3,000 for travel documents.

Some pricing examples are as follows:

24 year old Mary has booked a 20-day USA road trip and has selected a $100 excess:

• Options policy = $173

• Travelsure policy = $144

• New Student Flights Travel Insurance = $130

26 year old Jason has booked a 6 month working holiday in France and has selected a $100 excess:

• Options policy = $646

• Travelsure policy = $539

• New Student Flights Travel Insurance = $496

29 year old Sarah is volunteering in Cambodia for 10-days and has selected a $100 excess:

• Options policy = $87

• Travelsure policy = $73

• New Student Flights Travel Insurance = $67

18 year old Peter is travelling around the USA for 12 months and has selected a $100 excess:

Covermore has 24/7 emergency assist, will give you a free global sim card when you purchase the policy and you can make all claims online – The new best cover for under 30’s has arrived, and is here to stay!

Every second year, we head back to the UK for Christmas as my partner is from there originally. This year, we’ll be taking back an 8 month old with us and so are going to extend from the normal 2 weeks, to 3, giving us all time to adjust a little easier.

As much as we love England, we also want to go somewhere we both haven’t been before, and the idea of a wood log chalet in the snow, somewhere with awesome Christmas markets and mulled wine sounds bloody heavenly, and so the search is on.

Chris suggested Bavaria, as he’s been briefly before when he was in the army, but Austria is also not too far – I fear Switzerland will be too pricey for living expenses for a week (after my few days experience there years ago), so I’ve tentatively ruled it out.

And so, we won’t be locking in something concrete until the baby in born in April, but I’m throwing the questions out to you –

I’m fairly conflicted about where I want to spend my Honeymoon. And may I preface this with no, I am not engaged, however as a travel agent (and in a long term relationship) who regularly plans holidays and honeymoons I of course think about my own. It’s a complicated decision between beach haven, flop and drop to the action/adventure feeling accomplished kind of getaway – our honeymoon really shouldn’t be any different from any other holiday we’ve taken together (apart from those lovely perks like champagne and chocolates on arrival and maybe a free transfer!), but there always seems to be a lot of pressure to make it so. Here are my top 3 honeymoon destinations for myself at the moment, hopefully it will give some of you some inspiration as well!

BORNEO

Borneo has always been at the top of my list, for its one main attraction – the orangutans. It’s actually the third largest island in the world, the largest island in Asia and has one of the oldest rain forests. It is also made up of 3 countries – Brunei, Malaysia and Indonesia, with 76% of it being classed Indonesian territory.

The rainforest is over 140 million years old, and this is where you can find the orang-utan in one of its only natural habitats left. There are also heaps of other amazing animals like the rhinoceros and sumatran elephant, and a ridiculous amount of fish species. You can take tours to see the Orangutans and places like Camp Leakey allow you to see them come in and eat everyday. One of the coolest things I found though was the sting less jelly fish lake – an incredible lake where millions of jelly fish who have lost their stingers migrate and move across eating algae everyday, and you can buy passes to go swimming.

CANADA/ALASKA

I cannot wait to go and do the Rocky Mountaineer across Canada, but I would love to do it in the Gold Leaf class cabin, so waiting until the honeymoon is probably the only time i’ll be able to justify spending that kind of money! The Rocky Mountaineer is a stunning train ride you can take through Canada, with many different routes and pricing levels. You get 360 views in glass domed cabins, stay some nights on board and some nights in hotel accommodation across the road, and have chefs of board to cook you all of your 5* meals (think eggs scrambled with smoked salmon, topped with kelp caviar and lemon chive crème fraîche for breakfast).

We’d then be able to go on and explore Alaska some more, which has always interested me with their natives, customs and cultures.

WORLD TOURING

My third option would be a bit of a ‘Jennifer Hawkins’ style honeymoon, with a little bit of everything included. She started with the actual wedding in Bali (which I would skip), but went on to do Paris and the Maldives on the way home. I would love to go and explore a new European country i’d never been to (maybe some sailing around Greece, or take a trip to Finland), and then come home by some beautiful exotic ‘over water cabins’ kind of island for some relaxing and treating. The Maldives are incredibly stunning, as is Bora Bora.

Igloo Island (Finland)

3 very different honeymoon destinations, all of which I think I’ll eventually get to do – but with a baby on the way, I have a feeling child friendly is going to be a key element to every holiday, so being able to do something on our honeymoon that we wouldn’t be able to with baby in tow will be high on the priority list!

How about you? What’s your favourite dream honeymoon destination, or one that you’ve actually been on?